It's barely been four months, but Caper, still 20 years old, sounds like a different man.

"Going into the spring, I had many goals — I have to do this, I have to do that," said Caper, slated to be the Spartans' No. 2 back behind junior Le'Veon Bell. "But ... I really don't have to do too much, just be myself, continue to run hard, and not do it for my glory, but do it for God's glory, everything that I do, every rep that I take, whether it's the game or it's a practice. It really doesn't matter which arena that it's in, because you only have one audience. Just with that, I got peace with it. And having peace, you play better."

Caper and teammates Fou Fonoti, Chris Norman, Taiwan Jones, Niko Palazeti and Travis Jackson were among the Spartan athletes who attended the Christian camp focusing on competing with mind, body and soul.

"It was structured after how our day will go in our sport," Caper said. "So we'll watch film, we'll have practice, then we'll have reevaluations. Read a book from the Word, then try to translate that book into our actions in sport. And we have reevaluations on how we felt putting those things into action."

Teammates have seen the change in Caper's approach and demeanor.

"Larry, he's always been a great guy," said Jackson, the team's starting center. "Football's such a pressure-filled sport — (you're) constantly getting judged by coaches, people, fans, whatever. That's a pressure that weighs on you as a person. When you go to that camp, you kind of learn what's really important and it's life and god and having God in your life and doing those kind of things, and the eternal perspective. You can do your best to glorify God with football, but there's a lot more important things out there."

Said Caper: "Like in the spring, my mom was trying to tell me those things, I wasn't trying to hear it really. When I went to the camp, I started to focus in on it and just observe. There is a difference. I feel a difference in my body when I'm playing."

In three injury-filled seasons — concussions his latest battle — Caper has rushed for 728 yards, less than 300 since leading the team in rushing in 2009 as a freshman out of Battle Creek Central.

He's hoping for more beginning next week. But he's not measuring his worth by it.

"It's just relief because you're not worrying about what's going to happen in the future," Caper said. "With anybody in college, you always worry about that next step going on into real life. When you have that peace it's like, everything that I've done, it's not just for no reason, it's for a reason. God has a plan for us.

"(The camp) gave us eternal perspective. I feel like now we're in a world where everything is short-term, like, 'I have to do this to get this, I have to do this to get this.' But in all reality, none of that really matters. Because this short four years that we have now in a lifespan of like 80 years, really doesn't mean anything if we don't have great moments. Those moments come from team, from just having great camaraderie with your teammates, not being selfish."